What it means
by Quarto
Summary: Immediately after "The Final Problem," Sherlock and Molly work out what "I love you" means.


Author's note: Porn! Happy porn, for once! But porn. Stop reading now if you don't care for such.

* * *

It was the next day, just barely, when Sherlock rang the bell at Molly's flat. From the street he'd seen the light in her living room was still on, and so he wasn't surprised when she answered the door quickly.

Molly looked as exhausted as he felt, pajama-clad, bare-legged, and shadow-eyed, her hair loose around her shoulders. She stood in her doorway, blocking his entrance, and asked, "Was what you said the truth, or not the truth?"

Sherlock considered, and said, "The truth."

"Oh," Molly replied, "That's good."

"Though there were unusual circumstances around the statement."

"I'd rather picked up on that when the bomb squad showed up, yes," Molly agreed drily, and stepped back to let him into her (trashed) flat.

"Did they find anything?"

"Cameras. But no bombs."

"She didn't lie about that, then."

"She? No, wait, Sherlock-" Molly hemmed, "I'm _really_ tired. Can we finish this discussion tomorrow? You know where everything is, I'll be upstairs when you're ready."

Molly climbed the spiraling white stairs that led to her bedroom, leaving him standing amid the rubble of her books. Sherlock shrugged out of his coat and ran his hands through his hair. He was technically quite hungry, but the thought of actually eating made him feel like he'd taken a mouth full of soot. Molly probably had a packet of his L&Ms in the back of her freezer, but that (or a drink, which also appealed) were two steps along the road back to the needle that he ought not take today.

Toby picked his way through the rubble and bumped up against Sherlock's shin before ambling off again.

Finally he decided on a shower, and stood under steaming water and washed away... the scent of an old forgotten well. The smoke of an exploded home. Tears.

He towel-dried his hair, put on his pants again and climbed the white stairs to Molly's small loft style bedroom. She was curled up on her side of the bed, and Sherlock slipped between her crisp sheets and took her into his arms. Forehead to forehead, he paced his breathing in unison with hers, and more quickly than Sherlock could believe he slipped silently into the darkness.

* * *

He lurched awake some untallyable time later, gasping and tense and, well...

In the dark, Sherlock rolled his eyes.

_Typical response to arriving safely home after danger, reminder of mortality encourages the lizard brain to procreate._

_Three to five times a night, each lasting 25-35 minutes, is what the NHS says is normal for men your age._

_And really it's hardly the first time you've had an erection in Molly Hooper's bed._

But this time she was _with_ him in all senses of the word _and_ she'd rolled over so now he was spooning her and pressing it _right_ against her bottom which seemed terribly impolite.

Drawn taut as a bowstring, Sherlock could feel the moment when Molly awakened and could feel… well, him. She stretched, and rolled over onto her side, her soft hair tickling his arm, spoke into his chest.

"Sherlock," she murmured quietly into the dark, "I've never known… I don't know how you feel about sex. And whatever the answer is it's, it's _fine_, I won't mind. Whatever you need from me. But can you tell me… what "I love you" meant to you?"

His awkward and badly timed erection was pressed firmly into her hip, as he replied, "I suppose it can mean many things."

"Mmm hmm," Molly agreed.

"It could mean this?" Sherlock asked, tilting her head up and capturing her mouth in a kiss.

When he broke away a moment later, there was a hint of a gasp in her replied, "Possibly."

"Or this?" Sherlock asked," running a hand up beneath the worn jersey of her sleepshirt. The texture of her breast was (he noted, in the part of his mind still functional) unique, unlike other parts of the human body with similar fat contents, and her nipple was hardening under his palm and oh-dear that was _remarkable_.

"Mmm," Molly purred, and slipped her small, warm hand beneath the elastic of his briefs and wrapped around him, "Or this?"

"Oh, God," Sherlock gasped, "Yes. Yes yes yes."

He kissed her again, frantically, as she stroked up and down his shaft, expertly manipulating his foreskin. Her nipple (pink? brown? he'd never actually seen them and deduction wasn't magic but he suddenly deeply wanted to know) was pebbling as he plucked it between finger and thumb.

Molly broke away from his mouth, peppered kisses along his jaw, salted with, "Yes, God, yes" and Sherlock came to his senses, grasping the wrist of the hand doing such good things to his cock.

"Molly," he stammered, "You should know that while I'm not a virgin, I'm also not... perhaps not as knowledgeable in this area as you might be expecting a man of my age to be. It's been years."

Technically most of it had been _decades_. And drug-fueled. And meaningless.

"I want it to be good for you, but-"

Molly interrupted him, stroking his chest.

"It will be good because it's _you,_ Sherlock. That's all that matters."

Sherlock Holmes frowned. He did not much care to be patronized. So with almost no effort he rolled Molly onto her back (she was so small and slight, he could snap her like a twig, destroy her, it would be easy) and bracketed her with his arms.

"No, Molly," he said flatly, "It needs to be good, because this is _it_ for you."

With a bit of her help, he stripped off her shirt, leaving her in what were undoubtedly cute cartoon-character pants although he could barely make her out in the darkness.

"Do you understand that? There won't be another man in your bed. Ever again," he said, nipping at the crest of her collarbone.

"No, there won't," she agreed breathlessly.

"If you have children," Sherlock declared, kissing a string of pearls down to her (enticingly mystery-colored, he'd have to do this again with the lights on quite shortly) nipple, "They'll be my children too."

"Oh, God, Sherlock, I love you," Molly gasped out.

"Though God knows why you would, really, it's not as though either me or Mycroft are particularly good approximations of acceptable human beings and my sister is possibly literally from hell and who knows how those sorts of genetic things shake out, is it possibly something with a protective measure on the Y-chromosome which would _not_ be typical of most heritable conditi-"

Molly twined her fingers in his hair and tugged. Gently, not enough to hurt, just enough to break his train of thought.

"Sherlock, breathe," she murmured.

Ah. He hadn't been. When he tried, it helped.

"I have the coil in. If... if we decide we want to do that someday, we can talk about it then. But just breathe."

He did.

"I love you," he whispered raggedly.

"I love you," Molly replied. So he kissed the soft skin under her breasts, her belly, her flanks until she was distracted and writhing under his ministrations.

"Anyway. No more psychopaths or stupid _fiances_ in your bed," he said, "Only me."

"Only you."

"Nobody will hurt you. Nobody else will fuck you-"

"Mwip."

Sherlock stopped what he was doing.

"Was that wrong?" he asked.

"No..." Molly said, and somehow from the tone he could tell that that brilliant pink flush was covering her cheeks, "It's just... it's just a bit hot when you swear."

"Duly noted," he smiled, nipping at her inner thigh, "And I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thine eyes."

"Bloody hell, Sherlock," she gasped, "Quoting Shakespeare is _cheating_."

"This is what you have to deal with now, Molly Hooper," he laughed. How was he laughing? Sex was normally deadly serious, "My stupid theatrical tendencies, not talking for days, violin playing, _nightmarish_ family... you're stuck."

"Yes. I want it. I want _you_," she keened, "Wanted you for so long."

"You'll have me," he said, lapping at that tender crevice between her thigh and her labia, "God help you."

_So long celibacy_, thought Sherlock, without an ounce of regret, hooking his fingers in the waistband of Molly's pants and dragging them down her thighs, ultimately flinging them off somewhere into the dark.

"I love you," Molly whispered.

"I love you," Sherlock replied, and buried his face in her sweetness. She was hot, and slick with wanting, and made the most delightful sound when he brushed his lips across her slit. And the scent... he'd been a bloody fool to deny them this for so long.

As he'd mentioned, he wasn't hugely experienced. But it was hardly rocket science: important bit is front and center, pay attention to the feedback received (grinding into face while pulling hair and moaning good, slight stillness bad), calibrate accordingly. Molly was helpful, as per usual... responsive, vocal... really providing ample clues for the attentive observer.

"Inside me?" she murmured, desperately. Sherlock shrugged, wet his first two fingers in his mouth, and obeyed, suckling at the firm pearl of her clitoris as he did so.

She was noisy in the buildup, but Molly Hooper, when she had an orgasm, did it almost silently. Just a barely audible, "Aaah," and she went limp.

He hadn't, he noticed. But he ignored it for the moment and crept up the bed to lie next to her.

"Okay?" he asked, shyly.

"Meh," she said, and snorted a giggle, "Of course you're brilliant. All of you is brilliant. I'm actually a bit scared how you'll do once you've done enough to consider yourself a skilled practitioner."

With nudges on his shoulder, Molly rolled him onto his back then pulled off his pants. Kneeling between his legs, she stroked him, slowly and thoughtfully. Sherlock thought he might die, and he didn't particularly mind.

"You know it's not all on your side, Sherlock," Molly mused, stretching over his body in the dark, dropping a soft kiss onto his mouth, "You have to have _me_."

"I love you," he replied, stretching his neck to bring his mouth to hers.

"Yes, I love you, I know, but..."

There was some brief rearrangement above him, and then... God God God... she sank onto him. So tight, and hot, and wet, he would never want to do anything else, and... buggering fuck, in his limited sexual experience he had never actually done this particular position and what in hell was he supposed to do with his hands-

"On my hips," Molly gasped. He grasped her, feeling the silk of her skin over her hipbones, and held tight. He hesitated as to how the thrusting was meant to work but Molly set up a gentle circular motion and that was better than anything he could have imagined.

"You'll have to deal with my jokes."

"I like your jokes," Sherlock said, "They're generally quite witty."

"It's not like my family is exactly a treat either."

"Your brother is a drunk womanizer, which I admit is obnoxious, and your mother is a harpy," Sherlock laughed, "But I've still got you beat."

"Oh..." Molly sighed, as he angled his hips up, "You'll have to listen to _Take That_ with me."

Drunk on her as he was, Sherlock could only say, "I will be in the room with you while you listen to _Take That_."

And Molly laughed, and lowered her head to kiss him, her hair falling in a curtain around them.

"I love you," she murmured.

"Love you," Sherlock agreed, and with her weight on her hands he was able to drive harder into her, and that was so bloody good.

"Love you, love you, love you," Molly keened, as they sojourned on together, until (thank Christ) she arched her back and came and he was able to finally, _finally_ let go, coming inside her with one final whispered...

"I love you."

And for the moment nothing else needed to be said.


End file.
